1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a system for inventorying computer programs, and, in particular, to a network distributed product manager system.
2. Description of the Related Art
Inventorying software products across a network has traditionally been a manually intensive task. In the absence of dedicated tools to assist them in the process, system managers often face a tedious and time-consuming task of computer-by-computer visits to determine what software products have been installed on a particular computer. Even in cases where system managers keep accurate and up-to-date records of the installed software products, users often install software products themselves, thus requiring the system manager to visit to each computer to determine a full inventory of the software products installed thereon.
Thus, there is a need in the art for solutions to these problems. Specifically, there is a need for search and deployment tools that identify software products installed on various computers in a network.